Board 8 > Post Each Time You Beat a Game: 2022 Edition

(+) Yeah! (+)

Fighters Megamix Sega Saturn

It was a fun old fighting game!!!

I got all the new achievements in Vampire Survivors too. I forgot that it's not actually 1.0 yet.

Zone of the Enders (360)

I came in expecting to drop it because of its lackluster reputation, but I rather enjoyed this one. It helps that I did skip all the cutscenes after like a third through the game after coming to the conclusion that no character, story beat, or lore was even remotely interesting.

Shantae (Switch)

So even for a GBC game, there's a lot of jank here. The completely pointless lives system (this isn't even the sort of game that had them in GBC days, no idea what the logic behind it was), huge number of blind jumps, bad hitboxes, lack of an in-game map, and absurdly unforgiving race with Rottytops all stand out. I also feel like the Switch version could have done quite a bit more to add QOL features. Like, at least put "use item" on its own button? There are plenty of them going unused.

Despite all that it was somehow pretty compelling, the transformations were all fun (if janky), and I'm glad I finally played through this classic.

Yeah Shantae 1 has definitely not aged particularly well, even among GBC games which in general probably haven't aged too well for the most part, but there's still a lot to like about it.

The rest of the series is fantastic.

I think I'm committed to playing Risky's Revenge and Pirate's Curse, at least. We'll see about the whole series when I get that far. Looking forward to seeing how it improves over time!

Some itch.io clean up, these were under an hour each:

Escaped Chasm (PC)

It's more of a demo/pseudo-prequel than a full game, but it's intriguing. It's made in RPG Maker but doesn't have the RPG Maker "look", which is nice. I thought the story was a metaphor for depression but it turns out that the world was actually ending! Surprise!

Tiny Dangerous Dungeons (PC)

A mini-Metroidvania that is very platformer focused, though you do get the ability to kill... eventually. Nothing incredible, but it was fun while it lasted.

Bear With Me: Collector's Edition (PC)

I've heard things about this game's ending. Nothing specific. Just how it ends. And the whole twist of it. That's all I knew going into this and well. When I saw the twist coming as early as halfway into the game, I really dreaded that it was coming to that.

Bear With Me bills itself as noir first and foremost and it does it well enough. Checks all the boxes and hits familiar beats. But then it had to hybrid itself with some horror as well, which is incidentally downplayed. I wish it didn't have to add that honestly once you see the reveal coming, as it diminished what made the mystery portion great. In the end, it wasn't about solving the case so much as it was a story about a girl who had to deal with some things in the guise of a mysterious case. Which is a shame as this setup had some amazing ideas going for it that could've been explored better. But with the way it ends, there is certainly nothing coming back from that.

Make no mistake though, this is noir in its purest form and honestly you should just skip the game and watch the story. I haven't seen some monologuing like this since Max Payne. Its all so charming too seeing as it takes place in the imagination of a child.

Okay I've done my best not to spoil it for you. Now I will talk about it. So you can stop reading past this point if you want to enjoy a nice little noir adventure.

The main reveal is that the girl Amber is the creator of the setting and all its inhabitants but a trauma has relegated her into having amnesia. This trauma is played for horror and doesn't truly come into play until the final act when the game suddenly drops the noir in favor of some Fran Bow-esque introspection. But. This reveal isn't played for Cosmic Horror. Even when its revealed that Amber is basically a demigod in this world, there is no sense of impending doom for its world and in fact how this world exists is never explained. They might as well be two separate realms (and the creator confirms this). I thought it was the right move, and it didn't displace the greater portion of the game as a means of irrelevant fantasy. By the end it was still very much about the noir and the horror was downplayed. But. I still preferred it shouldn't have existed at all.

Game's decent. Puzzles are decent. Music is fine. And the part many probably will gripe about is the amount of 4th wall breaking references and jokes made both in and out of character which to me is fine seeing as this whole thing is played in the imagination of a child. But if you don't like that kind of cheesy humor then you probably might not like this game unless you're really into the noir of things.

There was also a dlc included which was a prequel starring the brother. And knowing what's to come even though it is barely touched here, it still saddens me. This is a good game for me and I wish it wasn't as slow and deliberate as it has a right to be so people wouldn't get bored so they can join me here where they get to see its ending. This is a hard suggest but if you're a point-click fan, it's adequate to say the least.

Nioh: Complete Edition (PS5)
Still have the DLC to go but I have defintely beaten the game at this point. It is a harsh game compared to Souls, and not always in a good way. Not managing stamina properly is instant death. It's loaded with hours of stat-tweaking minutea without good explanations in-game or anywhere else. But the combat is still cool when it works.

Simoun posted...

I'm actually surprised that there are some hardcore point-click fans who praise this game and hold it in high regard. Most probably nostalgia goggles at work. Coming 3 years after Broken Sword 1, even if it was one of the first "3d" adventures (which is what fans often boast about) it was still shite.

I have played the second game and yes it is more of the same. But more than anything I hate that the game's story just keeps finding reasons for the main character to remain in Syberia, utterly destroying what little character she's had. I honestly don't recommend it and just watch a Let's Play or something.

As for me, I hear that there's a 4th game now or something. And I am morbidly curious how the 3rd one plays. I hear alot of flak for it even amongst the fans.

Yes I felt like I was missing something because I had also heard some praise for the game from fans of the genre. But it didn't get better, unfortunately. I think I might have the third one in my library as well.

I've never heard anything but good things about Syberia 1+2. Haven't played them myself, but I bought them on Steam a few years back. Hearing that they've not aged well (and might have even been bad to begin with) is pretty unfortunate!

What's funny about the 3rd game is apparently Syberia which was built up as this abandoned mysterious wonderland is now inhabited all along. Guess they finally waited long enough to be animated lmao

Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner (360)

Combat is much improved, but I feel like the game took steps back in many other critical areas, so in the end, it feels like only a marginally better game.

Police Shootout (PC)

Its one of those games made by the people who made tons of "Simulators" that if they just stopped being so prolific they can actually make a decent game. So yeah I was just curious about this one. It wasn't half-assed but it was jank. Some interesting ideas never explored further and it mercifully ends before it could get anymore stale or exciting.

Puppeteer (PS3)

I was prepared not to like this game very much, but to my surprise, I actually really liked it. It's a side-scrolling action platformer that came out pretty late in the PS3's lifespan. Sony Japan put it together, and clearly there was a lot of effort involved. It's gorgeous to look at, it's got a great style, and the English localization is very polished.

The game is presented as if everything is taking place on the stage of a Japanese puppet theater. The story revolves around the moon kingdom, which has been taken over by the animals of the Chinese zodiac. Their leader, an evil bear, captures the souls of dreaming children to enslave and devour them. One child, Kutaro, escapes his clutches but loses his head in the process. You control that child as he travels the moon, defeating the evil zodiac animals and collecting shards that will bring back the moon goddess and restore light to the moon.

Since Kutaro lost his head, he has to collect other puppet heads in order to stay alive. Each hit causes him to lose a head, but he can keep a couple spares. He also gains a few magical abilities throughout the game, the most important of which is a pair of scissors that can cut through most things. The scissors are used to defeat enemies, but more importantly also as a way to cut through fabric to traverse the stage. Most stages end with a boss that you will use Kutaro's skills (and a series of quick-time events at the end) to defeat.

The game is split up into 7 "acts" that each have a different theme (e.g. western, Halloween). Every stage is lengthy and unique and filled to the brim with detail and interesting things to interact with. As Kutaro travels through each stage, there is a constant narrator that tells the story, but also many other characters that are all professionally voiced. Just be prepared to sit through a couple hours of cut-scenes by the time you're done.

Although playing the game is not particularly difficult or interesting, I was impressed with the production of it and the story ended up being very enjoyable. It's a very charming game.

Water's Fine (PC)

More itch.io backlog. This game kinda reminds me of Downwell. It's a 2D, "2-bit", procedurally generated game about diving and collecting treasure. You have a rather strict air limit and lose your collected treasure if you don't return it to the surface. You can buy upgrades with whatever you manage to bring back, and use those upgrades to get further. Unfortunately once you get the infinite torpedoes upgrade, it kind of breaks the game because you can kill any boss in seconds. There are 3 bosses plus a bizarre 1st person pseudo-horror game sequence at the end that felt out of place and unnecessary.

Bioshock: Infinite
Completed all three this year. Better than the second for sure, not sure if I like it more than the first.

Mini Ghost (PC)

More itch.io. This is a fairly small Metroidvania where one of the main methods of making progress is obtaining keycards, which is like... you're making a game in the genre that specifically *shouldn't* do that. C'mon. That being said, I thought it was quite good. Highly recommend remapping the controls.

Skul: The Hero Slayer (PC)

A better Dead Cells made by a couple of Koreans I think. Well it feels very Korean what with the obsession with combos and theorycrafting wrapped in a roguelite. I didn't have a very strong opinion for Dead Cells and this game fixes almost all its flaws. 90% of the items you find in this game passively reshape your character instead of giving you a super-random set of weapons and modifiers to play with. This encourages you to stick to a certain "costume" (of which there are around 30+) until the end as they are upgradeable and with that so do your abilities. This also brings more focus to the actual fighting and platforming.

There is no mana or stamina. Instead you only have to worry about synergies and cooldowns of which you can permanently upgrade overtime. The story is solemn but not the focus. You'll see the twist coming a mile away and those last 3 boss fights will be extremely hard to swallow. Sadly, the game is currenly at 1.5 and there doesn't appear to be any "True Ending" in sight. There are also some things in the game that appear to be placeholders for what's to come. Maybe I'll revisit this game in the future; I'm done with this and do not really want to wait after spending months on it.

Oh yeah and I beat this free itch io game called Just More Doors (PC) awhile ago but only now got 100% all the rooms. This game was fun, experimental, and just silly. There might be a couple of spoopy rooms but this is not a horror game. More like a tongue in cheek Stanley Parable that wears its novelty a little too fast after awhile.

Hopefully by then you'll be able to beat this game by solving its biggest riddle. Open the door to win!

Telling Lies (XB1)

For obvious reasons, one can't help but compare this to Her Story. While that tale was riveting from start to finish given its ambiguity, brief clips, and single setting and chatracter, Telling Lies was a more uneven experience due to its relatively clear and fixed narrative and much longer clips.

American Man (Switch)

One of the worst games I have played this year .So awful.
A very poor Contra clone where you can't even JUMP AND SHOOT.
It's very short and you get no continues if you lose your life meter.
Awful enemy placements on the last level.
I deleted it after I beat it. Stay the hell away from this game.

Link: The Faces of Evil Remastered (CD-i/PC)

I used to own a CD-i long ago. I liked playing Link: The Faces of Evil. Yes, I legitimately liked it.
It played just like Zelda II: The Adventure of Link and I like that game too.
Playing this remaster was really something. I liked how everything was faster compared to the original, for better or worse. It also has a hint system.
If you beat Hero Mode, you get to play as King Harkinian.

Shadowgate, Deja Vu, Uninvited (NES/PC)
I replayed these via 8-Bit Anthology: Volume I
It felt really cool replaying these with mouse control.
There was also one small minor change added to Uninvited for one of the puzzles you get to click on the safe and type in the numbers to enter the safe combination.

Deja Vu: MacVenture Series (PC)

Beat this version for the first time. I dislike having a timer before you die.
Other than that, was nice to see some of the things here uncensored (some stuff was censored for NES)

Shadowgate: MacVenture Series (PC)
Replayed this version. Played the Mac version of it. What I dislike about this version is that the torches run out too quickly. There was another thing I disliked doing but it did made sense having to empty our your inventory anywhere on the screen in order for you to cross the bridge after drinking Bottle 2. It made sense since you can't carry a lot of things in your inventory cause it would weigh you down.

The Uninvited: Macventure Series (PC)
Again, having a timer where you eventually die from making too many moves is pretty awful.
This version was still kinda cool.
Overall, the NES versions are the best way to experience the ICOM trilogy over the MavVenture Series, IMO.
I find them more lenient and fair. I also like the music in all three of those games too and they add to the general atmosphere IMO.

Swords and Bones (PC)

A nice short action/platformer. It has two endings.
It's inspiration is of the likes of Castlevania/Ghosts 'n Goblins.
You can also upgrades yourself too.

Roar of Revenge (PC)

I really liked this one.
Heavily inspired by Rastan and it even has the look of Faxanadu.
You get power-ups and abilites as you progress further into the game.
I even managed to get the best ending on my first try. I recommend it if you're looking for a really good retro inspired action/platformer.

Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters (Arcade)

Played this with a friend on Fightcade and did all of the Courses.
It's very fun to 1 CC this game.

Volgarr the Viking (Switch)

Inspired by Rastan with a touch of Castlevania and Superr Ghouls 'N Ghosts.
This game is awesome and very satisfying.
I had put this game down for two years before going back to it while I was still diving into my backlog.
This game is hard. Very hard. But it's a satisfying type of hard where you feel very satisfied passing each level.
There were no cheap deaths or anything of the sort. If I died, it's because I made a bad decision or it was my own fault.
Patience is the key when playing this game and tossing spears is the safest thing you can do.
I got Ending C. Maybe I'll go back to this game one day and try for a better ending. It has a different path you can take with different levels and another ending.

The Real Ghostbusters 1987 (Arcade)

Played this with a friend on Fightcade.
This was an ok game. It originally was a game called Meikyuu Hunter G.
Only difference was it played the Ghostbusters Theme throughout the game and you were playing as unnamed Ghostbusters.

WWF Wrestlefest (Arcade)

Played this with a friend on Fightcade.
We beat the Tag Team mode and became the Tag Team Champions by defeating The Legion of Doom and successfully defended the Tag Team Championship.
I was Jake "The Snake" Roberts and he was Big Boss Man.
One of the main highlights was when we both hit our respective finishers on the LoD and got the pin (DDT and Boss Man Slam).

Captain Commando, Knights of the Round, Warriors of Fate, Armored Warriors, Battle Circuit (Arcade/PC)

Replayed all of these via Capcom Beat Em' Up Bundle.

64th Street: A Detective Story (Arcade)

Played this via Fightcade with a friend.
He was Rick and I was Allen.
This game has the cool mechanic of tossing enemies into the background, a mechanic we
would see later used again in Batman Returns on the SNES.
It also has a unique mechanic where you can toss your partner and do a special dual attack.
So yeah, this beat em' up had a few nice things going for it. Too bad the final boss was disappointing.

Hook (Arcade)

Played this via Fightcade with a friend.
I was Rufio and he was Peter Pan.
This game was really good and followed the source material very well.
Also, I like how at the end of this game, Hook Movie Spoilers: Rufio lives and doesn't die in the game's ending! That alone makes it cool to me.

Mega Twins (Arcade)

Played this via Fightcade with a friend,
Very fun action/platformer. Graphics are nice and colorful.
Solid stuff.

SEGA AGES Sonic the Hedgehog (Switch)

It was neat playing this game with the Spin Dash and Drop Dash but I never really used them much.

Castle of No Escape (PC)

Replayed this one. I find myself coming back to this game quite a lot. It's addicting to me.

Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World: The Game (Switch)

Replayed. It felt neat playing through this game again. I still have it installed on my PS3.
Beat it with Scott.

Dragon Climax (PC)

This game is good stuff and simple fun.
You play as two different characters.
One character's game play is inspired by Kung Fu/Kung Fu Master while the other character plays like Shinobi.

P.O.W.: Prisoners of War (Arcade)

Played this on Fightcade with a friend.
This game was ok. The intro of the game is very memorable when the main character, Snake, sets the explosion to break out of prison to fight his way through freedom. It was fun using knives and machine guns.

Violent Storm (Arcade)

Played this on Fightcade with a friend.
This is part of a trilogy of Beat Em' Ups. Crime Fighters (first game), Vendetta (second game) and this game. Story wise they are not connected.
This was Konami's last beat em' up they made at the Arcade and it shows.
I was Wade and my friend was Boris.
The graphics are great. Bright, colorful and huge sprites. The OST is godlike,
One of the best beat em' ups around.

Lumbearjack (PC)

Small distraction of a game that's pretty easy (like seriously the collectibles per level are just THERE sometimes). But very charming. 20 levels in the vein whos graphical style and simplicity is in the vein of Donut County and Untitled Goose Game and gotta be honest I almost felt bored around the city arc but mercifully it ends before it could jump the shark. I just find the entire concept hilarious as I'm pretty sure a bear slapping humans into becoming more environmentally conscious is as entertaining as they come.

Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim (PC)

Played Oath in Felghana last year and thought it was... eh, fine. Prevailing opinion seems to be that Ark is a little worse, but I feel like they're about on the same level. Combat, plot, characters - they all feel pretty samey to me. I may even have a slight preference for Ark; there's fewer bosses I'd call bad and annoying, the OST is a little more to my taste, and I feel like Oath overstayed its welcome just a tad whereas this one really didn't.

This era of Ys just ain't quite for me, but I've enjoyed my time with it for what it is. One day I'll get to the most recent ones in the series, though.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge (PC)

This game is good. Really, really, good.
Very good beat em' up.
Love the mechanics, graphics, controls, animation, OST,
It is good stuff.

Shantae: Risky's Revenge - Director's Cut (PS5)

So, this resolves all my complaints about the first Shantae. In all respects it just plays much, much better. That being said, it's definitely less ambitious, and I don't really care for the graphical style even compared to the GBC visuals. I had a few issues with dropped inputs, but I think it's just because of the PS5 controller's crummy d-pad. Also, Shantae herself was not terribly likeable in the first game, but in this one she kinda goes off the rails into just being a lazy asshole to people for no reason. That's a pretty minor gripe though.

Looking forward to playing Pirate's Curse next!

Pikuniku (PC)

Since GotM had it, I decided to try it myself. Like was advertised it was something to beat in a single day, had it's enjoyable moments but also didn't have a lot too it and the charm wore off pretty quickly.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge (PS4)

Did a full six-player run through the story mode last night (with Nick, Wigs, MSG, SHINE, and Icon). With six players on the screen a ton of enemies also shows up and it's easy to get confused on where you are, but we had fun regardless! It's a solid game and worth the purchase.

Shantae and the Pirate's Curse (PC)

Definitely the best Shantae of the three, though I feel like my "ideal" Shantae game might just be Shantae 1 remade in this game's engine, with a map. The lack of transformations is kinda sad, but it makes sense with the story and the new abilities are fun.

In terms of plot this is probably the best one of the three. All the major characters are more likeable, though this has come at the expense of making them pretty different from their previous personalities (and almost universally dumber, except Shantae, for whom it's a lateral move). I really liked the Shantae + Risky team-up. On the other hand, this game is - unfortunately - significantly hornier than previous games in the series.

I had occasional issues with input lag, but I think it was my computer shitting itself trying to run this utterly undemanding 2D game.

I've ordered a hard copy of Half-Genie Hero Ultimate Edition but I think I'm gonna take a Shantae break and play something else first.

Kenri posted...

I've ordered a hard copy of Half-Genie Hero Ultimate Edition but I think I'm gonna take a Shantae break and play something else first.

This is fair. Marathoning a series, especially in a first playthrough of the series, can be draining. When I did this with Uncharted I had to take a few months break between 3 and 4 as much as I was enjoying it.

Alba: A Wildlife Adventure (PS5)

This game owns. The only issues I had with it were the slow walking speed and, more annoyingly, the ~20% chance that the game would freeze for 5-30 seconds every time I interacted with... anything. I don't know what was up with that. I can see myself coming back to this every couple years, especially because it's short enough to play in one sitting.

I played through that earlier this year on XB1 and had no technical issues

Yeah, a Google search doesn't turn up any other complaints about it either. Pretty bizarre.

I watched somebody play a bit of it on Twitch and it looks great! I'm thinking of getting it!

Super Mega Baseball 3 (XB1)

As I have done with the previous two titles, I rocked the Crockodons. The in-game baseball action and mechanics are the series' finest up to this point, but, and I don't know why they keep doing this, but they will often slow down the action on defense when the ball is in the vicinity of a fielder (usually infield), and all it does for me is halt my momentum and adversely affect my timing. I was hoping that there was a setting to disable it, but that still doesn't appear to be the case.

Also, ego (aka difficulty) changes are only saved once you complete/start a game apparently, which I didn't discover until late in the season why it didn't seem to be getting more difficult even as I kept upping the ego.

DragonGargoyle posted...

Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D
I'm surprised that I barely ever see people consider this to be their favorite DK game

I mean, why would we when DKC, DKC2, and DKC3 exist? Returns and Tropical Freeze are good, great even, but the best DKC games after the originals are Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair and Kaze and the Wild Masks.

KCF0107 posted...

I mean, why would we when DKC, DKC2, and DKC3 exist? Returns and Tropical Freeze are good, great even, but the best DKC games after the originals are Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair and Kaze and the Wild Masks.

Ooooof hard disagree on this and the absurd idea of ranking DKCR above Tropical Freeze. Impossible Lair is fantastic and still nowhere close to Tropical Freeze, the GOAT platformer. It has tons of cool ideas, but the actual level design and atmosphere is leagues behind. That said, Tropical Freeze is so much better than Returns in everything it does, using a very similar formula, I could see myself putting Returns at the bottom of the list below all the originals. But I'd probably tie it with DKC 1 at the bottom (and they're both 9/10 games still).

Also funny enough, my most recently beaten game:

Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D

Played the original multiple times and just bought this for the exclusive levels at the end. And honestly...worth it as a huge DKC fan. That Cloud world was splendid. And it had been long enough since replaying the original that a fourth playthrough was still fun to work through to get to that bonus world.

I also rebought Tropical Freeze on the Switch and I'm hypedddd. Literally my fourth favorite game of all time. I bought it just for the slightly better resolution, but I'll check out Funky mode. Just kinda not that interested in lessening the difficulty - the challenge is one of my favorite things about the Retro Studios DKC games.

Forest Guardian (Switch)

I'm not even really sure why I finished this. I was very much not impressed by my first ~45 minutes with it and took a long break after that.

Okay, let's start at the start. This is supposed to be a cute, fluffy, gay VN, which is why I bought it when it was, like, $2. But I have got to start cross-referencing games on the eShop with Steam (which has actual tags) because. This is straight up a hentai game?? And the eShop description for this T-rated game doesn't even mention that??? Okay, there aren't any explicit sex scenes but there's a lot of gratuitous nudity (barely censored by fog in the Switch version). It's awkward, especially because I started playing this during downtime at work.

Thankfully the game gets a lot better. The writing (which was pretty awful at the start) improves, though it never gets more than serviceable, and the more pornographic dialogue/CGs drop significantly in volume and frequency. The plot never gets great and the ending is abrupt, but again, it's serviceable and even sweet or sad at points.

My verdict is still "probably don't play this" but I ended up not too disappointed by it after all.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredders Revenge

I did not know really anything about this game going into it, had no expectations (Was actually assuming it would be kinda bad)

Well, it's great. Great sequel to the old Konami games!

Beat it first try! I was down to my last continue and almost last life....it was a bit nerve wracking lol
I don't have Kacey Jones though. I beat it on Arcade mode, that may be why...I really don't feel like going through it again by myself just to unlock him though right now lol

But I can only imagine this is great crazy 6 player madness like the Xmen arcade game was.

Oh right, the soundtrack was great as well. Never would I ever thought Mike Patton would sing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme song lol. Mega Ran was good as well.

Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment (PC)

Combat is improved from Plague Knight, but the platforming mechanics were a downgrade, and it was frustrating how easily and often Specter Knight would trigger a wall run when I didn't want them to. That being said, I feel as if the level design was better tailored to Specter Knight than they were to Plague Knight.

Final Fantasy X HD Remaster (Switch)

Was such a long time ago, and after replaying FFXII earlier this year, I wanted to replay this one as well. I still love it, I can definitely see it a little more objectively now, but in the end, I still get emotional playing it and I love the pace and pacing of the game. I was afraid this game would disappoint playing it for the first time after 13 years, but it pretty much holds up for me fortunately. This remaster is also pretty good, at first I wasn't happy that the console versions didn't have the QoL-stuff the PC version got, but this game doesn't need them like the PS1 FF's do. The game does look and sound great in this remaster.

Of course FFX-2 is also on here, and I'm actually really looking forward to its lighthearted sillyness and fast, job-based gameplay.

paperwarior posted...

Shotgun Legend (PC)
Pretty good straightforward Zelda 1 clone.

This sounds neat. I shall wishlist it.

paperwarior posted...

Vampire Survivors (PC)
All achievements. Now I'll have my work cut out for me finding something as low-effort to play when I can't get motivated or don't have the lack of distraction for something else.

New Update is dropping tomorrow. More Achievements to get!

Shovel Knight Showdown (PC)

I first thought it would be cool to play as Propeller Knight, but the AI is obscenely good at blocking/countering on normal difficulty, and I ended up having to use a continue on the first fight. Not wanting to have to suffer running out of continues while late in the story mode, I decided to just play on easy and used Polar Knight. It was much more enjoyable, but yeah this was a valiant but ultimately lackluster attempt to make a platform fighter.

SuperEpic: The Entertainment War (Switch)

Oh man... I'm so conflicted about this game. It's so, so close to being an all-time great Metroidvania game. The game world is big and there's lots of incentive to explore it all. The combat uses three different kinds of attacks: a forward combo on Y, an uppercut that knocks enemies into the air on X, and a smash that breaks enemies' guards or knocks them prone on A. There are also lots of unlockable special attacks that use a meter which refills from landing combos. The game's super original.

Unfortunately it drops the ball on execution, mainly because the whole concept of the game is... I hate to say it, but it's cringey (does the title give that away? probably). The villains are basically an EA/Activision/Zynga knock-off who brainwash the world with shitty mobile, pay-to-win games. But the main character seems a lot more concerned about the games being shit than the brainwashing? The dialogue is lousy and full of typos. The gameplay isn't incredible either -- for one thing, it's really easy and imbalanced (I didn't die a single time and rarely even used healing items) and you barely ever use any attacks other than your basic Y combo.

There are a couple weird, original features that are very cool ideas but which slow the game down. Each area has a treasure room with a QR code. Use your IRL phone to scan the code and it'll take you to the Evil Corp's website to play a minigame, which are knock-offs of things like Flappy Bird and Crossy Road. Beat the minigame to get a code that you plug in in-game to unlock the treasure. There's even a whole clicker game minigame you can play on your phone to earn codes redeemable for in-game money. It's weird and cool but like... do I want to do it again on a replay? Not really.

Also, the best ending requires rescuing all the prisoners (understandable) and destroying every security camera (imagine Castlevania keeping track of the candles you break, and gating the true ending behind destroying all of them. it's not quite that bad but yeesh). This probably ate up a full 2 hours of my ~9 hour playthrough.

I've had that downloaded on my PC for over two years now. I will get around to it one day.

I too have had Super Epic on my Switch/PC as well. I'll eventually play it.

Vampire Savior: The Lord of Vampire (PC)

Played it via Capcom Fighting Collection.

I finished Arcade mode with my main Jon Talbain.
Easily one of my favorite fighting games of all time.

Kunai (Switch)

This game is very cool in a lot of ways, but it sort of feels like a proof of concept? I'm not sure if that makes sense. It's like 6 hours long just following the main story, but it feels like it should be closer to 10-15 and give you more upgrades and areas to explore. Maybe it's not even the length exactly -- it's just as long as something like Super Metroid but that game feels much more packed with progression. Here it takes achingly long to accomplish anything of note, and then the game ends very quickly afterward.

Also, this is an insane nitpick but I just struggled with the final boss for like an hour (this is definitely the kind of game where the bosses are disproportionately harder than everything else) so I have to complain about it. They just. Didn't program the ability to skip cutscenes right. Like they fucked it up somehow? You press +, and it'll say "press + again to skip". So you press it again and nothing happens. And you think, "maybe it didn't register?" so you press it 57 more times and finally it works if the cutscene wasn't over already anyway. Just. Bizarre.

Jak 3 (PS3)

I played the first two Jak games on PS2 when they were new. It was my brother's system and he moved out, taking the thing with him. So I never got around to the third game.

I bought the Jak PS3 collection for myself in 2012, but after playing through the first two games, I think I was just kind of tired of Jak games. I played maybe an hour of Jak 3 before I decided to take a break for a little while. That break ended up taking 10 years.

I came back to it finally this year, as part of my goal to finish all my ps3 disc games. I started the game over, and this time it was fresh enough that I made my way through it pretty quickly. I enjoyed it! I'm not sure if it's better than Jak II and it's certainly not better than the first game, but it probably is easier than either of them. Much more forgiving checkpoints this time, although a couple of missions still had some frustratingly long periods between saves.

The twists/reveals in the story were very predictable, except for the precursor thing which was completely out of left field.